Question

Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst were similar in that both were ____.
A. muckraking journalists who wrote articles that exposed government corruption.
B. moralising commentators who chastised the public for their vices.
C. anti-imperialist editorial writers who pushed the United States in an isolationist direction.
D. publishers who owned newspapers, which sensationalised accounts of events.
E. writers of non-English newspapers that appealed to recently arrived immigrants.

Answer 1

Hint: Yellow journalism is described as the feature of news that emerged during the 1880s and became really popular due to its style of reporting. Pulitzer and Hearst were both competing journalists who had started their own newspaper agencies and used this format.

Complete answer: Yellow journalism is defined as the way of reporting which is completely sensationalised, to spice up the news piece and make it more interesting for the readers. This involves a lot of exaggeration and mystery making into the process which can be considered falsification of news. This addition makes yellow journalism highly controversial.
This is what was done by Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst in the 1880s. While Pulitzer was the owner of the newspaper ‘World’, Hearst occupied ‘Journal’. Both of those were New York City newspapers and sought to oust each other by sensationalising news and gaining more readership through it.
Since they were newspapers nonetheless, they would have been involved in news of corruption, international affairs and all other kinds of events. But their primary aim diverted from reporting only news to sensationalising it.
Thus, the correct answer is option (D).

Note: The Pulitzer prize is given for proficiency in the field of American journalism, photography, poetry, literature and fiction. This prize has been named after Joseph Pulitzer and is presented by Columbia University.